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Scott of course shows his true colors again as a rabid partisan, by advocating literally unpersoning his political opponents.
In terms of the actual proposal, I don't see him argue in any sensible way why contempt isn't an adequate method of enforcement. Sure the courts may be slow sometimes, but they can be fast when they want to be. And his proposed "unpersoning" would also require the courts to make a move, so no reason for that to be any faster.
Scott Alexander is hysterically overrated just because he actually criticized wokes a bit back during the era where the spineless techies that make up his fandom were busy cowering and licking progressive boots.
That's not fair, he used to be a good writer that used to be able to show he properly understood the arguments he disagreed with.
He used to be a somewhat ordinary young man with an eclectic reading habit, allowing him to mix weird rationality ideas while still understanding the opposite perspective. Then he became an incredibly successful and popular writer and moved to San Francisco where he now lives with his wife, children and mistress.
No matter how much he tries, if he does still try, he can’t really empathise with the people outside the blessed circle. They’re just too different from him now. At the same time, general political polarisation has continued to the extent that I doubt he ever meets any right wingers any more, even the weird kind.
It’s the same problem that’s occurred since time immemorial and is the reason why (as I understand it) Republican politicians were discouraged from spending too much time in Washington.
I think people were literally warning him this would happen if he moves back to California.
They did. But it worked for him, he’s fine. He doesn’t need influence with conservatives and frankly I don’t think he wants it.
I think also that he just made his peace with woke. It’s less confrontational than it was, and he agreed with most of it to start with, and the main issue he had with it (feminism) is no longer an issue for him.
In other words, he betrayed us once it was no longer in his interest to oppose the woke.
He got rich and famous enough that he managed to get married despite being a textbook beta nice guy; what does he care now about the plight of the incel? He makes his money in the normie-ville of substack and his psychiatry clinic; what use does he have now for cultivating a following by spreading heresies? Being controversial now would only threaten all he has.
Telling heterodox truths is a game for anonymous young single men who have nothing to lose and everything to gain. Established men become assimilated into the system.
Who's "us"?
I agree Scott got soft, but stability and family making you more mellow and less of a firebrand is an eternal cycle, it's how things are supposed to be. It's why Kulak in his incessant calls for violence never actually talks about building things, starting families, falling in love, having children. Men who have lives and families to care about don't want to burn down the world.
I think it may be more nuanced than this. As a man with a life and a family, I don't want to burn down the world, but neither would I piss on it were it on fire. I'm content to let it burn and there are many areas I think would benefit from a swift hot fire.
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